Wolf and Slippery Surfaces
by Zellarius Burvenia
Summary: Lawrence introduces Holo to ice skating.


The taste of last night's apple mead soured like Holo's mood as she shivered at the lake's edge. Her headache had tapered off into a dull throb since waking. She recognized this sort of hangover. It would not fade until dinner, by which time she would be courting another one.

She'd have to sleep _extra_ late tomorrow.

"Ready, Holo?" The voice was familiar too, though in a less pleasant way than usual. It was an iron prodding the smoldering logs in her head, a fresh spike of pain bursting forth like a shower of sparks in the fireplace. She saw the man at the edge of her vision, a refreshing blob of darkness in a blinding vista of white.

She would not honor him with her gaze. If she could set him afire with her eyes alone, then by the gods, springtime would come early to this frozen lakeside.

"Why did I let you go through with this? Remind me to give myself a stern tongue-lashing." Holo faced stubbornly forward, addressing a rotting yew across the ice. "We could be back at the inn in Lamtra right now, feasting on hot bread and cheese, if only you'd listened to me!"

"Forgive my ignorance. You slip into a strange language when you wake from a night of heavy drinking. Is it a Yoitsu dialect? You'll have to teach it to me one day."

"The knowledge would chase the mercantile arts from the limited space in your head. You could not survive simply on the privilege of talking to me." Their interminable sparring had resumed. Holo parried the barb while fighting back a smile. Fending off two foes at once? Surely there was no greater duelist than she.

Lawrence raised his eyebrows, smiled with half his mouth. "And here I thought you were used to this kind of weather."

"You humans are delusional," Holo sniffed. "Even the greatest of greatcoats is a moth-eaten rag compared to my fur. Admit it - you are not warm. You are simply _less cold_."

"You call it delusion." Lawrence sat on the stump next to Holo with a _crunch_ of snow. "I call it resilience." Another, larger _crunch_ as he set a burlap sack down before them. "Besides, if we were so used to the cold, why would we come up with so many ways to distract ourselves from it? Now put your boots on."

Holo eyed the sack as Lawrence opened it. He shucked off the thick shoes he wore, and she wrinkled her nose. Men's feet, honestly...the scent was agony to a wolf. In moments her companion had replaced his shoes with strange boots with blades on the soles. He stood again, walked to the lake's edge. His muffled steps turned to the scrape of metal on ice. "Come on, or you'll be frozen there forever!"

Holo drew a smaller pair of boots from the sack, turning them over in her hands and frowning. "Do you expect me to hunt with these? They are a poor excuse for claws." Even so, she shed her shoes and slipped the boots on. The laces were tight, the balance awkward; her tail twitched back and forth below her dress as she struggled to walk upright to meet Lawrence.

They faced each other on the lake's surface. Lawrence smiled down at Holo; she returned a haughty glower, arms crossed. "All right," she said. "Now what?"

"Hold on."

Lawrence plucked Holo's hand from her chest. Before she could protest, he kicked off with one foot, gliding impossibly across the ice. Holo yelped, ears standing straight up, as she was pulled sliding after him. Most vexing of all was her compliance: she did indeed hold on. She dug her nails into Lawrence's palm as she gripped his hand, as they shot over the lake like a pair of dragonflies. Lawrence, damn him, was laughing. The monotone grinding of the blades against ice underscored this happy melody as he stepped lightly from foot to foot, dragging the wolf behind him.

They were halfway across the lake when Lawrence stopped. He dug his blades into the ice, came to a sharp stop with a shower of snow at his feet. Holo slammed into him with another yelp. He caught her and stood her up straight, denying her even the pleasure of knocking him down.

Holo slapped his hands away, dusting herself off. "I am Holo the Wise Wolf! I need no help standing." When she could no longer avoid it, she treated him to a deadly glare. "What was that foolishness? Have you brought me out here to kill me?"

"Don't tell me you've never heard of ice skating!" Lawrence laughed. "People do it all the time in the winter. When the ice is thick enough you can do just about anything."

I think it's ridiculous," Holo huffed.

"Humans have a long history with ice," Lawrence said. "They say that skating was invented by northern merchants to pass the time as they transported their wares over the frozen seas."

"Hmph." Holo laid her ears down, turned and put her hands on her hips. "Truly your knowledge is boundless. Now tell me how to get back to shore."

Lawrence grinned. He had her now. "It's just like walking, except you keep your feet on the ice a little longer when you step. Just let yourself slide. See?" He stepped left, then right, then left again, floating smoothly around Holo. "Now you try."

Holo raised her hands off her hips for balance. She stared Lawrence straight in the eyes, searching for a trick. She found none.

She put her left foot forward. It slipped. Her breath froze. She tilted and waved her arms wildly, suppressing a cry as she leaped to her right foot. Left. Right. Left. Right.

It was several seconds before she dared to breathe again; several more before she realized she was moving forward. She kept her eyes fixed firmly on her feet as she sped across the ice. The skating was a fall she could never seem to stop, yet she would not, could not stop falling ever onward.

And Holo did not fall. She expected each step to be the one that would send her sprawling. Each one proved her wrong. Gloriously, exhilaratingly wrong. She ripped through the chill air, slipping through it as through the clutches of the earth herself. It tickled her ears, ruffled her tail beneath her skirt. She was skating. She was shooting over the ice like a comet shoots across the sky, and nothing could stop her. No ice could conquer Holo the Wise Wolf. She raised her head finally, a howl boiling up in her throat.

It emerged as the loudest squeak she'd ever heard. Her foot caught in something soft. She snapped to a halt, fell forward, her world growing whiter and whiter as-

 _PAFF_

The earth had snatched her at last. The smoldering ache in Holo's head returned with a vengeance, fed now by a burning knot in her chest. Pride, wounded. Joy, arrested. Pleasant surprise, double-crossed. The scrape of blades across ice drew a line under her defeat as Lawrence skated to her side.

"Are you all right, Holo? That looked like a nasty fall."

Holo bit back a growl, remembered where her arms were, dug her hands into the crunching, freezing snow, pushed, rolled. She lay on her back in the lakeside snow, glaring a curse straight through Lawrence, who met her eyes with...concern? Whatever it was, it softened the burning hardness of her heart just a little.

Then he broke into laughter, and the moment was gone. Growling, Holo lunged upward, grabbed Lawrence's hand, and threw herself back, pulling him off his feet. He yelled as he slipped off those ludicrous blades, the sound crushed in the snow next to Holo. He winced, opened his eyes. His met hers. Both sets narrowed.

Then they both laughed.

"Now who's trying to kill who?"

"Be silent until I am better at this than you are."

Two human-shaped imprints remained in the snow throughout the rest of that day. Until it snowed again that night, passersby would almost swear the smaller one had little animal ears atop its head.


End file.
